Crush These Small Business Goals for 2019

The beginning of a new year is a great time to reflect on what worked for your business in 2018 and what didn’t. It’s also a time to set your business goals for 2019. If you aren’t sure where to start, here are 7 steps to make your business thrive in 2019.

1. Take Your Online Presence to the Next Level

The importance of an online presence cannot be stated enough. Make time to create an online experience that benefits both you and your customers. Ensure your website is a reflection of what you want your business to be. Whether it’s modern, clean, classic, informative, captivating, or fun, it should be representative of your future rather than your past.Additionally, commit to exploiting all of the opportunities that social media offers. Whether it’sbuilding your number of customer reviews, optimizing yourYelp profile, targeting yourFacebook advertising, or starting anInstagramorTwitter account for your business, social media is an amazing platform for reaching out to customers and building relationships.

2. Increase Your SEO Ranking

SEO rankings are what help search engines decide whether your website appears on the first page of search results or the sixth page. This is important because close to 60% of shoppers research products online and only 25% of those people will look beyond the first page. Making sure that your product pops up on the first page is vital. Improving your SEO ranking should be an ongoing goal because the algorithms for SEO rankings are always changing.

3. Identify Your Target Audience

Are you aware of which people are more likely to buy your products? Marketing is expensive, and you are more likely to convert leads into sales if your marketing efforts are directed at the people who buy your products more often. This is your target audience.You canfind your ideal customer by doing a little bit of research. This research will help you to identify your niche so that all of your future developments are designed to appeal to that niche. Don’t try to make everyone happy.

4. Update Your Customer Service Procedures

Quality customer service is important if you wish to retain customers. Proper customer service is becoming so important that it is predicted to be a more significant metric than price when it comes to attracting customers. Studies have shown that more than 70% of customers blacklist a business because of poor customer service.More customer service interactions are now happening online than ever before. This is because customers are able to open support tickets that can be responded to via email either instantly or later if there is a backlog. Customers want to be heard, and they want to be heard on a medium that is convenient for them.

5. Work on Your Email Marketing

Email marketing is easy to overlook. When compared to the more innovative ways of reaching out, it can come across as an outdated medium. However, 89% of marketers claim that email marketing is their main source for converting leads.Customers prefer emails, too. Over 70% of customers said that emails are their favorite means of receiving communications from the companies that they interact with. The trick is in figuring out how to make sure that your emails don’t end up in the spam folder.

6. Start a Blog for Your Business

People online are always looking forinteresting content. Starting your own blog where you can share important details about your product and your business is a great way to interact with new people, build your brand, grow your business, and entertain your customers all at the same time.You don’t have to be an expert writer to start a blog. You can get hints and tricks from other successful bloggers and adapt their tactics to work for your business. Just make sure your writing is free of grammatical errors. If you’d rather not deal with the hassle, you can hire professionals to create content for you.

7. Give Back to the Community

Consider supporting a charity to make a difference in the lives of others, boost employee morale, and develop a positive image of your business as one that is a conscientious contributor to the community. Local projects such as community clean-ups or food-drive sponsorships are great opportunities for small businesses to contribute. Channel your efforts to address the specific needs of your neighborhood.By focusing on crushing these 7 goals in 2019, you’ll grow your business, increase sales, and improve the overall image of your company.LightHouse Graphics specializes in several areas of online presence, including website design, social media management, and content creation. If your business needs assistance in these areas, contact us. We’d love to work with you.